KUALA LUMPUR: The Valuation and Property Services Department under the Ministry of Finance released its Property Market Report for 2024 on Feb 27, 2025 which revealed a historical high of property transaction activities in the country.
The full-year data for the Malaysian property market confirmed the strong market performance as highlighted last month by Rahim & Co in their Annual Publication Release. In 2024, the total volume (number) of property transactions in Malaysia was 420,545 transactions across all property subsectors, signifying a higher growth rate of 5.4% from the previous year. This was the highest in the past decade, and the third highest since the turn of the millennium. The other two higher periods were in 2011 and 2012, during the last Malaysian property market peak where it recorded 430,403 and 427,520 transactions respectively.
The total value of property transactions for 2024 showed an even significant level, breaching RM200bil for the first time in history. The total value amounting to RM232.30bil translates to a year-on-year growth of 18.0%. The total value of transactions includes, amongst others, transaction records based on Sale & Purchase Agreements from primary sales by developers which may have included prices before discounts and rebates. Nevertheless, the record-high figures, even after these adjustments would still be significant – indicating an improved market condition.
The improvement seen, at the national level, is evident across all property sectors with residential transactions grew by +4.0%, commercial at +13.6%, industrial at +7.7%, agricultural at +4.1% and development land & others at +9.7%. The growth momentum seen in 2024 reflected a rising market confidence coupled with supportive government policies and various incentives, despite global uncertainties and a challenging environment. The performance is considered very encouraging as the buyers’ sentiment is still mixed and being cautious - as many continue to face the challenges of rising costs and sluggish income growth amidst affordability concerns.
With the encouraging growth in transaction numbers, the total unsold completed properties or overhang properties also showed improvement with an overall overhang number decline. Looking at the largest component of overhang units, the residential overhang decreased by 10.3% to 23,149 units (2023: 25,816 units), while serviced apartments overhang dropped by 6.1% to 19,564 units (2023: 20,825 units). As the residential and serviced apartment units, plus SOHO units, are mostly purchased for living accommodation purposes, we collectively classify them as dwelling units. As a whole, the overhang statistics for these dwelling units (residential, serviced apartments and SOHO units) have shown a decline of 7.7% from the previous year, amounting to 44,585 units valued at RM30.79bil in 2024.
Nevertheless, the number of uncompleted unsold units that are mostly under construction was seen to have increased by 22.3%, amounting to 115,674 units. Though these units are still actively being marketed and undergoing the sales process, we highlight the need to closely monitor how the market absorbs these incoming units to mitigate future risks of overhang, after the reducing trend since 2021.
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